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The Commerce Ministry on Thursday requested the Bangladesh Bank to keep a quota of the US dollar to facilitate import of six essential commodities to ensure smooth supply of the goods during Ramadan later this year.
The ministry’s move comes as a dip in imports of a number of essentials created a concern regarding containing their prices before Ramadan, when demand for the items increased.
On Wednesday, businesses in a meeting with the commerce minister alleged that they could not open letters of credit (LCs) for banks’ reluctance amid dollar shortage and warned a supply shortage may appear if imports do not increase.
A ministry paper was presented at the meeting between the commerce minister and the essential commodity traders and processors held at the commerce ministry in Dhaka on January 4.
In the paper, it was shown that opening of LCs for import of raw sugar slumped 28% year-on-year to 375,000 tonnes in the last quarter of 2022.
In the case of chickpeas, it dropped 47% to 75,319 tonnes and dates 30% to 21,980 tonnes.
Commodity processors and importers urged the government to allow them to open LCs even if it meant releasing a portion of funds from the central bank’s foreign exchange reserve.
They also demanded a reduction in the exchange rate of the dollar for settling the import bills to cut costs as some have to pay as high as Tk111 for a dollar.
The six commodities mentioned in the commerce ministry’s recommendation letter were cooking oil, sugar, lentil, onion, chickpeas and dates.
The scarcity of dollars in the banking sector has badly impacted the import of basic commodities.
As a result, the price of some basic commodities went up in the local markets and also a section of unscrupulous traders has been making a hefty profit taking the opportunity of time.
(DT)
